God our Mother

Is God Motherly?

Is God Motherly?

“Our Father in Heaven…”

If you know one prayer, this is the one. And for good reason: when asked how we should pray, this is how Jesus began his model prayer. God is fatherly. And what a mercy that is! Frederick Buechner says, “It is only the words "Our Father" that make the prayer bearable. If God is indeed something like a father, then as something like children maybe we can risk approaching him anyway.”

Throughout his ministry, Jesus calls the first person of the Trinity “Father.” It’s not without reason, then, that we refer to the three persons of the Trinity as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Scripture teaches us that if we want to see what fatherhood was intended to be, we ought to look to God. But that doesn’t mean God is actually a father. Nor does it mean God is only fatherly.

What if the perfect model of fatherhood and of motherhood was God?

Scripture teaches us that if we want to see what motherhood was intended to be, we ought to look to God as well.